Alaska Highway

Tue July 24- Complimentary hotel breakfast at Denny's! Pretty good actually...and one meal is plenty for two! After packing up our laundry and getting groceries we drove north to Dawson Creek. At Dawson Creek the Alaska Highway starts and continues for 2288 km (1422 miles) to Delta Junction, Alaska. The entire Alaska Highway was built in just 8 months in 1942 by the US army to better supply and defend Alaska... since Sarah Palin could see the Russians, Pearl Harbor had just been attacked, etc... We dont think the road made much of a difference in the outcome of World War II, but along the road the people seem to think differently. All in all, a very scenic and remote drive. This first night we stayed at a campsite at Charlie Lake, just north of Fort St. John. Very pleasant evening, relaxed at camp and worked on the previous blog entry.

The Alaska Highway at Muncho Lake

Wed July 25- We drove and drove, and then drove some more. The landscape changing from high peaks to drier prairie back to high peaks again. Scattered all around many lakes and endless boreal/pine forests. A couple of weeks ago, we met a woman at a ranger station in Yellowstone who asked the ranger a rather random question: "what is the definition of wilderness?" This must be it... While passing many rundown 'towns' that we will not remember the names of, we did see tons of wildlife. Our theory that wildlife is best viewed from the car is holding up nicely. We passed caribou, bison, deer, sheep, moose (unfortunately he did not pose) and many more bears. We especially enjoyed the two BIG black bears crossing the road in front of us (looked like they were chasing each other) and the black and grizzly bear cubs. After entering the Yukon Territory, we stayed at a campsite near Watson Lake.

Sheep

Thu July 26- We continued on to Whitehorse, quite a nice town! All the towns in this area were once gold mining settlements established during the Yukon, Klondike and Alaska gold rushes. In Whitehorse we did groceries and had shower at an interesting hippie campsite. A couple of hours later we arrive in Haines Junction, gateway to Kluane National Park. Checked-in with the visitor center, enjoyed some nice pastries at the Village Bakery and setup camp at Pine Lake just outside of the town. Now that we are 60 degrees North daylight is abundant. At 1030pm we were enjoying the evening sun at our campsite. At midnight it is still light out and many children are still up, running and screaming. At 8am however, the campsite is very quiet.

Grizzly cub

Fri July 27- After three days in the car it was nice to go for a hike. We hiked King's Throne, 30 km south of Haines Junction. A steep hike with excellent views. The sky was cloudy, but still beautiful views. We tried to get all the way to the summit, but the trail was rather steep and the shale made it very slippery. Halfway up we decided to turn around (LB was too scared!) since going down would be treacherous. This turned out to be excellent timing. As soon as we got back to the car it started pouring! On the way back to camp we stopped at the visitor center to see a video about Kluane National Park. Three quarters of the park is covered in ice and only accessible by air. It is basically ice left-over from the last ice age- just like Wrangell St Elias (Alaska) where we will go in a couple of weeks. The park also houses Mount Logan, Canada's highest peak just short of 6000 meters. If the weather is nice and you have money to spare, you should go on a scenic flight and land on a glacier... (maybe next time for us:-) ) We spent the evening under our tarp and made Canadian fajitas.

Kathleen Lake, Kluane National Park (LB bottom right)

Sat July 28- Packed up the wet tent and enjoyed a morning coffee at the Village Bakery (THE place in Haines Junction- really - since the local trading post closed there is no other place to buy most food). Did a little research on where to stay when we are in Maui... given the rain a nice prospect! The weather cleared just enough for us to do a hike at Sheep Mountain. Very pretty hike going up the side of a mountain with excellent views of valley, glacier and nearby mountains. Apparently the area has the largest heard of Dall Sheep, but we did not see any.. We stayed our last night in Canada at Snag Junction, just South of Beaver Creek, Canada's most western settlement.

The mountains in Kluane

Sun July 29- We spent our last Canadian Dollars on expensive gas, 1.50 Canadian Dollar per liter ($6 per gallon!). Compared to The Netherlands still cheap of course.. After a short drive we made it to Alaska! Woohoo!! At the Tetlin National Wildlife Refuge visitor center we picked up some maps, watched a video and almost sold our car to a park ranger. We passed Delta Junction, the end of the Alaska Highway, before arriving in Fairbanks. We executed the usual routine; visitor center, setup camp, shower, groceries, etc. After dinner we went to the movies and saw The Dark Knight Rises. Great fun! And when we exited the theater at 1130pm we were just in time to see the sun set...

ALASKA!!

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Canadian Rockies

Sat July 14- Just like when we visited Glacier National Park three years ago, we started our day with an excellent breakfast at the Park Cafe in St. Mary, Montana. A great little place with some good memories! Feeling sad that we were missing out on Glacier (surprisingly for a year long trip- just not enough time), we continued on to Banff. At the Canadian border there was a a car with a Massachusetts license plate right in front of us. Small world... The drive was fine, little drizzle, we stopped at an information center to upload the previous blog-entry and arrived in Banff in the late afternoon. We got a camp-site for two nights, set-up the tent and went to Banff center for a nice beer, pizza and salad dinner (actually had dinner there 2 days in a row...)

On the mountain in Banff

 

Sun July 15- Had a nice lazy Sunday-morning (even though we had no clue what day it was, or even what day it is now...) and did some internet at the local Starbucks. After grocery shopping for our Lake O'Hara trip, we did a short hike to the top of a nearby hill. Cloudy, but still a nice view of the town and nearby mountains. Coming down the mountain it started to rain, our first real rain of the trip! We drove back to the campsite and picked up some tickets for a Banff Mountain Film Festival showing later that evening. Back at the campsite we prepared for our Lake O'Hara trip under our rain tarp (we were wondering if we were ever going to use it!).

LB at All Souls above Lake O'Hara

 

Mon July 16- Day 1 Lake O'Hara- Got up early to catch our 8:30am school bus to Lake O'Hara in Yoho National Park, about 1 hour north-west of Banff. Thanks to Shelley (LB's mom) we booked one of the 30 campsites exactly three months ago. Lake O'Hara can be reached by an 11 km (Canada is metric) dirt road, but this road is not for public use... except if you want to hike in. A bus takes day-hikers and campers to the lake and there is limited seating so you have to reserve. We arrived to a beautiful campground, received the campground instructions, setup our tent and went for a hike. We hiked the first section of the All Souls alpine route and were rewarded with great views of the turquoise colors of Lake O'Hara. We continued on to Lake McArthur (still frozen in mid July) and then looped back to the campsite. We relaxed, read a book, had dinner with wine at the communal campfire and chatted with a lot of Canadians (our theory is that since you need to reserve it so far in advance, locals know better than tourists.. but of course there were still Dutch people there as well..)

LB at Lake O'Hara in the evening ( last one )

 

Tue July 17- Day 2 Lake O'Hara- We hiked the "alpine circuit" around Lake O'Hara. It was absolutely amazing! The hike started up Wiwaxy Pass, via Lake Oesa, then continued to Opabin Lake and returned back to Lake O'Hara (more for personal recollection than anything else..) If you have nice weather and 1 day at Lake O'Hara, this is your hike. Steep drop-offs which were sometimes a little scary, and Maurits had to assist LB on some snow-crossings- but all worth it for the stunning views! Back at camp we enjoyed the additional pasta that we now add to the "instant freeze dried packaged add boiling water wait 10 minutes and voila" meals. Later that evening we had a very interesting ranger talk on the Burgess Shale (which is in Yoho National Park). Burgess Shale are very rare 505-million-year-old fossils from right after the Cambrium Explosion. These fossils have taught the non-creationists a lot about evolution. Fascinating stuff and worth some more exploring. We walked back to our tent in the rain, where we enjoyed having our tarp once again.

On the alpine trail

Wiwaxy pass

 

The tiny specks on the bottom right are people on the trail

 

Wed July 18- we took the 930am bus back to the car (no need to reserve the bus out). It had rained all night and we had done the hikes we wanted to do at Lake O'Hara...so time to move on. After a short stop at Lake Louise we decided to continue further to Jasper. There is a lot more to explore in Yoho and the Lake Louise area, but unfortunately not enough time.. In Jasper we setup camp just outside the town, had a much needed shower and went to the visitor center. We were thinking of doing the Skyline trail, but the trail was fully booked and the ranger was not too excited about the Skyline trail to begin with. He was very excited about the Berg Lake Trail in Mt Robson Provincial Park and convinced us to go there. Using the free wifi at the visitor center we booked for three nights on the Berg Lake Trail. (We give a lot of credit to the Canadian tourism bureau- most visitor centers have free wifi and that makes life soooo much easier.) Then it was about time for a beer at the local brew pub. The Red Sox were winning...

Snow field crossing

Maurits had to jump on the iceberg...

Thu July 19- It was a beautiful day and we wanted to go on a long day-hike, but we had too many things to take care of. We did some internet, organized our health insurance, bought a GREAT bug-net (that we are sitting in as this is being written) and most important of all we bought our around-the-world ticket! Luckily we did have time to go on a surprisingly nice 2-hour walk in the foothills of Jasper (forgot the name, but it is hike no. 1 on the Jasper day-hike map). After preparing for Berg Lake we had dinner in our fabulous bug-net, no mosquitos! What did walk by was a very large herd of female elk, what a sight! Right in our campground! However one of the elk did not like Maurits and charged at him...TWICE! (completely unprovoked.... it was so strange) Luckily nobody got hurt, but scary! We need bear spray...

Before the Elk-Attack

 

Fri July 20- Day 1 Berg Lake- Drove 1 hour west to Mount Robson Provincial Park where we arrived the same time we left (we migrated to the pacific time zone). We got our permit, watched skipped a mandatory backcountry video, organized our bags and started the Berg Lake trail. The weather in the parking lot was superb, clear skies and a beautiful view of Mount Robson. As we progressed on the 22 km trail it got cloudier, humid, and stayed very hot. We saw some big waterfalls as we climbed the 800 vertical meters of the steepest section of the trail. With our heavy packs we were happy to arrive at the Rearguard campsite. Beautiful camp spot, close to Berg Lake, great view of the Berg Glacier and Mt Robson looming high above us.

Mt Robson from the car park

Mt Robson from the tent with Berg Lake and Berg Glacier

 

Sat July 21- Day 2 Berg Lake- After a damp night, we woke up to a glorious mist. Not much to see... Had a morning coffee in the tent as it drizzled on and off, then we relaxed and read a book. Around noon it cleared a little bit so we went for a half-day walk up to Mumm Basin. After a steep climb we got to a plateau that despite the clouds gave a great view of Berg Lake. Had lunch on a point that overlooks Jasper National Park, then walked via a waterfall back to our campsite. The weather got a little better, we had dinner and sat in between the millions of lovely smelling wild-flowers in the flood-basin just steps from our tent.

Rainbow

Sun July 22- Day 3 Berg Lake- Nice morning, clouds on top of Mt Robson, but good enough for our hike to Snowbird Pass. Early in the hike we got rained on, but after a beautiful rainbow, the clouds got fewer and fewer. According to the park ranger in Jasper, Snowbird Pass is the best day hike in all of the Rockies. We were not so sure about that, but it was a spectacular hike! We hiked past Robson Glacier, up to a gorgeous alpine meadow and then to the pass. The pass was snow covered and had a steep drop-off on the other side. Two beautiful views; one looking back to Mt Robson and the other looking out to a massive snow field/glacier with mountains in the background. Wow! We enjoyed the view, had lunch and hiked back. What a great day! Back at camp we had dinner under our bug-net, which resulted in some jealous looks from our fellow campers...

LB on Snowbird pass

 

Maurits looking out...

 

Mon July 23- Day 4 Berg Lake- It rained during the night and when we got up it was very cloudy, but dry. We packed up, had breakfast and started the hike back to the car. Then the rain started.. Heavy rain at times, very windy in the open, many flashes and thunders. All in all very comfortable hiking weather! No bugs, not too hot and knowing that we were going back to the car made it very enjoyable. We did feel sorry for the many ill prepared kids that were hiking in: walking in sneakers, sleeping bags sticking out of backpacks... We had lunch at one of the shelters where there was a nice fire going... packed with people, but a good rest-stop. By the time we got back to the car we were absolutely soaked and so was all our stuff... perfect time to splurge on a hotel room! Through the visitors center we reserved a room in Prince George, BC which was a 3 hour drive north-west. In our usual high pace: we checked-in, found a laundromat, hung all the clean but wet clothes in our hotel room, set the AC to max, found a good sushi place that was open late (it was 930pm by then) and then finally enjoyed the bed with clean cotton sheets.

 

LB looking out on Robson Glacier and Mountain

 

Hiking home...

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Tetons and Yellowstone

Wed July 4- Happy Independence Day! Fortunately DD Camera's Corral in Jackson Hole had a replacement lens in stock for our camera... back in business! We immediately put it to good use at the 4th of July parade making pictures of locals throwing corn from the farmers market float. After the parade we went for a drive through the Grand Tetons national park, had lunch, got our backcountry permit and had a hot shower. Back at camp we got organized for our first backpacking trip; breakfast, lunch and dinner all had to fit in the bear-proof-cannister!

Lunch in the Grand Tetons

 

 

Thu July 5- Day 1 Grand Teton Trek. Woke up to a cloudy morning.... what a nice change! To start our 3-day trek, we took the boat across Jenny Lake. The hike first went up Cascade Canyon (following a river up-stream) and then took a left to get to the back-side of the Grand Tetons. Shortly after we had set-up camp at a beautiful site along a river- it started to rain. Nice after the hot first week, but cooking a meal in the rain does get old very fast! The night is best described as cold and damp, sounds great huh! Distance 8 miles, +2100 ft

 

Hiking up Hurricane Pass

 

Fri July 6- Day 2 Grand Teton Trek. Clear skies!! Like every morning on a trek, our breakfeast consisted of oatmeal (sometimes known as porridge) with brown sugar and dried fruit. Big hiking day today, with lots of going up and going down. Thanks to the great weather we had spectacular views of the Tetons and the Alaska Basin. It was a long day, sometimes a little hairy crossing the slippery steep snow fields, but very worth it! LB even brought her ice axe- but luckily did not need to use it! Found a cool campsite on top of a ridge overlooking 'Death Valley.' What a great day! Distance 10 miles, +1900 ft, -1300 ft

The Alaska Basin

 

Sat July 7- Day 3 Grand Teton Trek. With sore legs, hips and shoulders we hiked back to civilization- our last backpacking trip was 1 year ago- have to get used to carrying a heavy pack! It was a long day, all downhill, and we were very happy to be back at Rockefeller's visitor center! Small detail... our car was 12 miles up the road. Next task: find a ride! LB's natural charm convinced Grizzly Man to drive us back to our car (retired neuro-surgeon now researching bear-brain-anatomy). Shower, beer, pizza... life's good! Distance 12 miles, -2900 ft

Great views!

 

Sun July 8- Rest day!! Finished our first blog, did much needed laundry, ate ice-cream and drove to Southern Yellowstone where we camped at Lewis Lake. Sleeping bag in stuff-sack fell from car... Maurits drove over it...sleeping bag survived.

 

Mon July 9- Like good tourists we visited Old Faithful and the surrounding geysers in Yellowstone national park. What an amazing sight! In the afternoon we prepared for our backcountry trek back at our campsite at Colter Bay - a dusty sandpitt that triggered a sandstorm with each step. Although we looked pretty silly preparing and cooking on the asphalt beside our car, it was better than coating all our food and belongings with dust. At 930pm we heard a very interesting ranger talk about the big bad wolves of Yellowstone. The wolf was wiped out of Yellowstone by hunting in the 1930's and reintroduced in the 90's. Amazing how such an animal can have such a big impact on the eco-system. Go wolf!

Geyser

 

Tue July 10- Day 1 Yellowstone Trek. The start of our second trek! We hiked to Heart Lake in southern Yellowstone through a landscape of burned Lodge Pole pines. Picture thousands of fallen or about to fall dead white thin tree trunks in every direction (caused by the great fires of 1988). New trees and plants have developed, but are still short compared to the dead trees. We passed many smoking smaller geysers and hot pools on the way to our camp on the far side of the lake. Our first camp was next to a warm river-the river receives hot spring water and was therefore very suited for a dip. Distance 12 miles

Mount Sheridan

Wed July 11- Day 2 Yellowstone Trek. In the morning we back-tracked to the other side of the lake and set-up camp right on the water. After lunch we set out (without our big packs!) to the top of Mount Sheridan - a very pretty hike through unburned areas. On the summit it was a little hazy - but still great views of Heart Lake, Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. Back at camp we were ATTACKED by mosquitos. Our defenses of deet, permethrin and a head-net barely held the line. We were finally rescued by a freak thunderstorm that produced 60 mph wind gusts that the mozzies could not stand. From the comfort of our tent, we could see our backpacks flying in wind and rain on the food-pole (the backpacks are hung by rope in a tree to prevent bears from stealing our food). We survived! Distance 14 miles, + & - 3000 ft

Headnet for protection

Thu July 12- Day 3 Yellowstone Trek. The morning can be best described as: "if you think you are too small to make a difference, you haven't spent the morning with a mosquito" (stolen from Bear Grylls). Very buggy hike back to the car. Had a long hot shower to rid off the Chanel No. 3 (sweat, bug-spray and sun-screen), did laundry and drove through the northern part of Yellowstone. We did not see any big wild life on our 3 days in the back country, but within three hours in the car we had seen a coyote, four elks, a grizzly bear, 100+ buffalo/bison and a black bear! We also saw Yellowstone Falls and a lot of yellow stone in the Yellowstone grand canyon... spectacular! All the Yellowstone campgrounds were full - so after a road-side dinner (nice view!), we left the park and camped at a primitive campsite located 5 miles down a dirt-road, at the top of the hill, without potable water, on a slightly slanted sight- but it was a great view!

Summit of Mt Sheridan with Heart Lake below

 

Fri July 13- Back in the car! Northbound to Canada. We stocked up on goods in Bozeman Montana; groceries and especially more bug-spray! After a beautiful ride through big sky country we camped at a KOA near the east entrance of Glacier National Park (three years ago we spent a week in Glacier). After dark sitting at our campsite, LB almost had a heart attack when two black dogs wandered into our campsite. She quickly backed away and exclaimed "hey bear" as the dogs promptly walked right towards her- with the fright it took a while for her to believe they were only harmless dogs!

Grizzly

 

Elk

 

Wildlife watching the Yellowstone way...

 

Coyote

 

Buffalo

 

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I90 West

Disclaimer: **what is to follow will be too detailed for most** This is a journal outlining memories of our year long trip. See below the map of our planned travel. Let us know if you want to meet us for part of the trip!

The route

 

Preparation- busy two weeks leading up to our departure day! Maurits quit his job June 8, his parents Harry and Henny came for a one week visit, we packed up our apartment, moved our stuff into a pod in 100 degree weather, stayed in Lexington for the remaining nights with LB's parents Peter and Shelley, LB signed an agreement to work at East Boston Neighborhood Health Center next year, she finished residency on Friday June 21 and we left 3 days later!

 


Tue June 26- despite Maurits' desire to drive all the way to Chicago in 1 day... we drove 11 hours west on I-90 to spend our first night camping at the KOA in Sandusky, OH. After five minutes on the road, we received a call from Shelley that we forgot the Turkey sandwiches- we could not pass up a homemade Chamberlain meal for the road- so quickly turned around and got the food! Starting milage on our 2006 Subaru outback 129381. Thanks to Justin Drew (Maurits coworker) for the audiobook Inferno: The World at War- we are learning about the military war of WW2 in excruciating detail on our drive west.

Our first camp

 

Wed June 27- the heat wave begins!! Sorry about all the future references to heat- cant help it- its been so hot... Drive to Chicago and arrive to 103 degree weather- no choice but to go straight to the rooftop pool at the Doubletree hotel. Found this hotel randomly on priceline- lucky choice because it was in the same building complex as Elizabeth Patton's apartment (LBs med school friend.). Wandered the city past the "Married with Children" fountains... had a beer under the "L"... then met Elizabeth for dinner and a PPD reading. Evening stroll to Navy Peer where we happened upon a beautiful display of fireworks set to pop music.

The 'mirror kidney' in Chicago

 

 

Thu June 28- OMG it is so hot! Started the day with a very interesting architectural boat tour of Chicago- thank you Aunt Jane for suggesting it. To escape the heat we headed to a campsite at Illinois State Beach Park on Lake Michigan- where the water was as cold as the Maine coast. Amazingly it took 1/2 hour to check us into our alcohol free campsite- the three park rangers that struggled to check us in were quite the motley crew. Nice to sit on the lakeshore and read in the cool breeze.

Alcohol free campsite

 

Fri June 29- 6 hour drive to Des Moines Iowa passing through two huge thunderstorms- one causing a 1 hour wait because a semi truck jackknifed blocking the interstate- to visit LB's college friend Kat Meeker and her boyfriend Josh. Highlight of the drive was stopping at the world's biggest truck stop on Iowa 80 and a visit to the roadside trucking museum!!! We also passed the birthplaces of Reagan, Hoover and John Wayne on the way! Kat and Josh were superb hosts letting us crash at their loft despite just moving in the day before and touring us around all the hot spots of Des Moines. Great to catch up with them!

Big thunderstorm fom the car

 

The world's largest Truckstop! And yes, we did visit the museum...

 

Sat June 30- Started the day with Kat and Josh at a fantastic farmer's market in Des Moines. Unfortunately they had sold out of corn by the time we hit the stand, but we were able to stalk up on lots of great fruits and veggies for the road (thanks to the giant cooler in the trunk of our car). Continued on the road west- but this time got off the main highway onto the Loess hills scenic byway. We enjoyed the beautiful rolling hills and miles upon miles of farmland. Happened upon a beautiful campsite in Southwood conservation area where we spent the night- the only tent on a large grassy golf-course-like field (the RV part of the campsite was full!).

Des Moines with Kat & Josh

 

Sun July 1- Next stop- Badlands National Park. Back on I-90 west- we think there were more billboards lining the side of the road than cars on the road (eg Walldrug.) But, still plenty of huge RVs pulling a large car in tow, which continues to amaze us. What a striking change of landscape- from the lush farmland of Iowa to the dry prairie- now we are in the wild west! The heatwave was definitely in full force here- the temp was still 93 degrees when we got into the tent that night at 10 pm- felt like we were camping in front of a large hot blowdryer! It was certainly amazing how many tourists were walking around the park in100 degree heat in the middle of the day.

Chamberlain in Chamberlain, South Dakota

 

The Badlands...

 

Mon July 2- Started the day at 5am with an early morning hike in the "moon-landscaped" badlands. To learn more about the geology we next went on a ranger led walk- the badlands started 70 million years ago when the american inland sea disappeared due to the rocky mtns forming, etc... After a disappointing stop at Walldrug (a tourist trap wild west town), we continued on to Mount Rushmore. As a side note we saw many motor bike riders, must be a white overweight baby-boom hobby! Also stopped at Walmart for groceries: America's favorite exercise room, unless you take the motorized shopping cart. Mount Rushmore- sort of like the White Mountains- Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt (T), Lincoln. Why is the mountain called Rushmore? There was a NYC lawyer called Rushmore who made the first donation of $5000 for the project. Sad ending to the day when our camera fell out of the car and the lens snapped off! :(

Mount Rusmore!

 

Tue July 3- Day spent driving to Jackson Hole Wyoming and trying to figure out how to get our camera fixed. Beautiful driving through the back roads of Wyoming- very desolate- with wildfires pluming in the distance. We had a running tally- 2:1 more pickup trucks than cars!

Hiking in the Badlands

 

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